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🌟 4 Steps To Turn Child-Led Play Into Learning

🌟 4 Steps To Turn Child-Led Play Into Learning Opportunities

1. Be intentional with how you spend your limited time, effort and energies.

More BEING, less doing

Being physically and mentally present to connect, listen to questions asked and facilitating learning opportunities that come up

2. Equip yourself with knowledge

Know the value of open-ended, unstructured child-led play, understand how children learn, the stages of a child’s development and how to facilitate learning

3. Attune to YOUR child

What are YOUR child’s interests, learning styles, sensitive periods, stage of development, strengths, abilities etc?

Don’t play the comparison game!

4. Facilitate the magic

And be amazed at how capable your children are at directing their own learning

…………………………….

I’m now welcoming NEW parents into The Authentic Learning Experience (TALE), my membership for intentional parents who want to learn how to turn child-led play into learning opportunities.

Join now and get immediate access to trainings, workshops and masterclasses that will help you understand

🌟 How children learn
🌟 Developmental domains
🌟 Play spaces
🌟 Home art space
🌟 Independent play
🌟 The art of the invitation
🌟 Raising creative kids
🌟 Raising resilient kids
🌟 Developing number sense
🌟 Developing early literacy
🌟 Scaffolding strategies
🌟 Open-ended play
🌟 Open-ended toys

and so much more.. plus monthly group coaching with me :)

Join now at the link in my bio!

Myself and over 400 other TALErs can’t wait to welcome you into our amazing community ❤️

www.storiesofplay.com/tale

To tell you the truth... I used to spend nap tim

To tell you the truth...

I used to spend nap times and any free time I had planning, preparing and setting up activities for my child as a first time mum (swipe to see)

Then about 4 yrs ago, after giving birth to my second, I decided to take maternity leave from doing planned activities and give myself grace to ease into my new role as a mum of 2 under 16 months.

I said I’d take a break from planned activities for a couple of months and go back to it when I was ready

In that couple of months, I decided to stop DOING..

And be more intentional about BEING in the moment…

We lingered over books & conversations during mealtimes, play and everything in between

And whenever I breastfed bubs from the couch, I took the time to REALLY observe and pay attention to what my toddler was doing, the things she was saying and the questions she was asking

That’s when I realised…

Even without me planning for learning, the learning & self-discovery never stops!

Their desire to explore, discover, experiment and to “figure things out” never stops

I just needed to be more attuned to what they were doing
Pay close attention
Not make assumptions
See the value behind what they were engaged in (which I know can be hard)
And when necessary, support them in the moment (swipe to see)

I share with you this story for two big reasons :)

#1 - Children ALL have a desire to learn
Learning just has to be meaningful to them.

#2 - There are soooo many learning opportunities present in child-led play.

Learning doesn’t have to be pre-planned or happen during a scheduled time.

It doesn’t have to look like you spending all your free time preparing activities to engage them.

O the joy & freedom you can have from having your children engage in play on their own and knowing that their learning can and will happen spontaneously even without you planning and preparing in advance for it 🎉

What do you think?
Do you believe that children’s learning can happen spontaneously even without you planning for it?

p.s Doors to The Authentic Learning Experience (TALE) are opening tmr!! I can’t wait to welcome more parents who want to discover how to turn child-led play into learning opportunities!

HOW BEST TO HELP CHILDREN LEARN Are you putting y

HOW BEST TO HELP CHILDREN LEARN

Are you putting your time & effort where it matters most?

The truth is as parents and humans...

We are LIMITED in our capacity

We have LIMITED hours with our children in a day

We have LIMITED time to do all of the things that we need to or want to do

We have LIMITED physical energy

We have LIMITED mental bandwidth that we have for being present with our children.

WE. ARE. LIMITED.

So when we focus more of our time and energies on one particular thing, something else has got to give

Sometimes in our desire to make learning more visible to us, and to make ourselves feel more comforted in the knowledge that our children can do <ABC> and know <XYZ> (not just referring to the alphabet here by the way!)

We end up spending a big bulk of our time and energies researching for play ideas, learning activities and thinking of various ingenious ways that we can help our children “learn through play”

And in the process…

In our well-meaning desire to do all the things and in our exhaustion…

We MISS OUT on being physically and mentally present

We MISS OUT on being in the moment

We MISS OUT on observing the incredible things they are doing on their own

We MISS OUT on hearing the interesting questions that they are asking and making ourselves available to answer them

We MISS OUT on making the world accessible to them

And the unfortunate consequence of that is opportunity cost...

curiosity
reasoning
questioning
critical thinking
comprehension
application
autonomy
independence
interests
motivation
passion
confidence

I never want to disrupt their play (and consequently their discovery and learning) with my own ideas of what's more worth their time, concentration and intent study.

I want them to always know that all of their interests are important, that ALL knowledge is worth pursuing no matter how insignificant it might seem, that their education is for fulfilling no one's agenda but their own and that they are perfectly capable of deciding and directing their own learning.

This is truly how we can best help our children learn - by helping them believe in their own abilities and capabilities. Agree?

#authenticlearning

It still feels pretty surrreal to write this…

It still feels pretty surrreal to write this…

But almost 5 yrs ago to the day, armed with a challenging 7mo who cried lots and slept little, I was feeling very lonely and isolated as a SAHM.

I chose to leave a teaching job I loved to stay home and be mum.

And whilst I loved/love being home and having the privilege of watching my girls grow up every single day, it wasn’t an easy decision to make.

Being a SAHM is easily one of the most thankless jobs in the world. Plus I truly loved my job as a kinder teacher pre-kids.

I missed teaching and I really missed the person I was before becoming mum.

To keep my mind engaged apart from the everyday mundane that is nappy changing, feeding and sleep settling, and to get connected with other teachers/mamas on the same journey as I was, and to find something I was passionate about and to do something that was just for ME, I bit the bullet and started this account to share the hows & whys of the play I did with my firstborn - stories of play if you will 😉.

5 years on, it still blows my mind that it’s grown to the beautiful community that it is today with so many of you following along, reading, sharing and being inspired by our stories.

Laughing with and relating to my laundry woes, sending me funny laundry memes because it made you think of me 😏😅🤣

Many of you have also become close friends ❤️

What’s even crazier, is that somehow, even in the midst of the chaos of having 3 kids in 3 years, this passion has grown into the business that I have today where I get to show parents how to help their children engage in child-led play that results in meaningful authentic learning.

Only by grace.

In fact, it’s been grace upon grace upon grace.

So incredibly thankful for the past 5 yrs but I know the best is yet to come.

I wouldn’t be where I am today if not for all of your love, encouragement and sharing what I do.

So here’s me humbly saying a massive thank you to YOU!

For being part of the @storiesofplay journey

For giving me the opportunity to do what I love everyday

For helping me champion “Playful Childhood, Abundant Motherhood”

All my love,
Jules

p.s I’m curious, any longtime followers here? ☺️

#SOPis5

DAY 5 - GO BIG… Go reeeeeeally big!!! How big a

DAY 5 - GO BIG… Go reeeeeeally big!!!

How big a surface have you ever offered your child to be creative with?

An A4 paper big?
A3 big?
A standing easel big?

Today is all about challenging you and your child to go bigger than that!

Think dining table big
Shower screen big
A whole door big
Fridge big
Garage door big
Your entire living room play area big (if you’re really brave 😉)

Most invitations to create gets our children to work on their fine motor skills.

But equally as important is to get them working on those gross motor skills too - crossing their midline, developing core strength, arm strength, shoulder/elbow stability, good posture, wrist extension, bilateral coordination, spatial awareness etc.

A child with more developed gross motor skills will have a better foundation from which to develop their fine-motor skills.

Also, the more children move their whole body, engage in active play and work off their wiggles and jiggles, the better equipped they will be to be less fidgety when they need to sit still and concentrate for a short period of time.

Movement is good and so important for our children’s learning and development so let’s go big with our invitations and invite/ give them the opportunity to move about as they get creative :)

Ready to go reeeeeealllly bigggg??
Swipe through to get some inspiration :)

DAY 4 - EXPLORING COLOUR Colour discovery, colour

DAY 4 - EXPLORING COLOUR

Colour discovery, colour creation and colour exploration, is one of the most fun invitations you can offer a child and the best part of this is the possibilities are endless and suitable for every age!

Even for a baby where they might not have any awareness, recognition and understanding of one colour from another, you can absolutely offer just one primary colour in any medium for them to explore - water, playdough, paint etc.

Because it then allows you to constantly talk about one specific colour naturally and meaningfully in context.

“Would you like to make red or blue coloured water for play today? The blue reminds me of the ocean. Do you think we should add some of our animals that live in the sea?”

“Look at the bright red playdough? I could make a crunchy red apple, or a juicy red tomato or a tiny raspberry.”

As they begin to recognise a few primary colours, it might then become time for you to introduce the rainbow spectrum of colours.

And then once they recognise more colours, introduce tints and shades by adding white/black to colours so you can talk about light/dark <colour>

And then finally provide two and eventually more primary colours and watch them discover how they can create new colours and come up with creative names for their own colours!

I tell you the truth - the excitement of self-discovery is like no other! :)

Can’t wait for you to give this prompt a go and see your little scientists in action! 🤩🤗

DAY 3 - WASHI TAPE One of those underrated but ex

DAY 3 - WASHI TAPE

One of those underrated but extremely versatile resource :)

Create directly with it, or include it as part of a selection of other bits and pieces

It’s a little fancy which would make it the perfect material for use if you wanted your little one to create a handmade gift for a loved one :)

One thing to note, a big mindset block here for parents when it comes to offering washi tape to your littles is “It’s so wasteful! They just pull out endless amount of tape and then that’s it”

I know.
Because I used to feel the same

But when you shift your perspective and intentionally look to see all the fine motor skills they’re learning, the way they work on their pincer grasp to pull pre-cut pieces off surfaces, and to discover how to get the tape off their fingers and onto paper, as well as the creativity they’re developing, you’ll gradually begin to see that these are all worth it

Depending on the ages and developmental stages of your child, you will need to vary the way you offer washi tape - whether it’s short pre-cut pieces or the tape along with scissors, or the tape on its own if they’ve developed the finger strength to tear pieces off themselves.

As always if you’ve got a little one who can’t create with washi tape yet, don’t be discouraged and think this isn’t for you.

I’ve exposed my girls to washi tape from 8mo (swipe to see pic 5), to help them work on their fine motor skills as they discover how to pull pieces off that are stuck on a plastic tray.

Then when they were pulling themselves to stand, I’d stick small pieces on walls to encourage them to pull up to stand to reach up and grab those little pieces off :)

ALL. THE. LEARNING. OPPORTUNTIES ☺️🙌🏼

So tell me, have you washi-ed? :)

p.s my Aus-based friends, you can find these in Kmart. But otherwise, good old Amazon :)

DAY 2 - DRAWING PROMPTS My all-time favourite inv

DAY 2 - DRAWING PROMPTS

My all-time favourite invitation to create prompt!!

Back when I first started encouraging my girls to spend time in our art area, I’d take 10 min at the start of every week to create a stack of these open ended drawing prompts and leave them in our art space for my children to discover (I don’t actually do these now as my girls are never short on their own ideas)

But back then, my girls loved this and it often sparked off various creative endeavors for them.

The thing I especially love about these prompts is there is no one way of using them. Depending on their ages and stages of development, two children can be given the same prompt and both will come up with something different.

Here’s a couple of quick tips to get your kids interested and engaged:

1) Think out of the box. Drawing prompts doesn’t mean they are only for drawing. I call them drawing prompts for easy reference. But they can most definitely be used as a cutting prompt, painting prompt, collage prompt etc.

2) Pair up these prompts with interesting tools and materials as an invitation to create. Washi tape, sticky tape, masking tape, catologues, cotton buds, toothpicks, crepe paper, cellophane paper, bubble wrap, aluminum foil etc.

3) Switch these up by offering them in different sizes (A4, A5, A6)

4) Use coloured paper to make things more interesting.

5) Get in there and create yourself. Whenever my kids are working on a piece of artwork, I’d make time to sit beside them and engage in some creating of my own. I want to make sure that my kids SEE me engaging in, valuing and ENJOYING creative activities for myself.

6) Most importantly, help your children to see that the value of being creative is so much more than creating a beautiful piece of artwork at the end. So as they create, comment on the process and demonstrate your interest, delight and pride as they create :)

Happy creating with these prompts!! 🤗

DAY 1 - PLAYDOUGH Had to start with this because

DAY 1 - PLAYDOUGH

Had to start with this because it’s a foolproof, failproof activity in our house.

A couple of weeks back, we babysat our 2 nephews for an entire weekend and we had 5 kids under 5 in our house and this was the singular activity that occupied them all for hours (no exaggeration)

Here’s a couple of ideas to get you started :)

1) Offer just one colour with playdough tools or mark-making tools

2) Provide two primary colours for colour mixing or colour exploration

3) Playdough with loose parts for storytelling, creating small worlds or creating mandalas

4) Playdough with legos or duplos for printing

5) And don’t think you can’t do this with a baby. Hot tip if you’ve got a baby, playdough in a clear zip-lock bag works a treat. Alternatively you could just squish them into a muffin tray and offer it as is for babies to poke, push or prod either with their little pudgy fingers or chunky tools. Doing it this way means it’ll be much harder for the little munchkins to mouth them :)

If you try any of these with your littles, make sure to tag or DM me pictures so I can come see and give you a 🙌🏼🤗

Happy playdough-ing!

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